In 1982, the studio was purchased by The Coca-Cola Company, and launched TriStar Pictures as a joint venture with HBO and CBS[citation needed]. Five years later, Coca-Cola spun off Columbia, which was sold to Tri-Star, as the latter became Columbia Pictures Entertainment. After a brief period of independence with Coca-Cola maintaining a financial interest, the combined studio was acquired by Sony in 1989.[3]

What would eventually become Columbia Pictures, CBC Film Sales Corporation, was founded on June 19, 1918 by Harry Cohn, his brother Jack Cohn, and Joe Brandt.[5][6]

Brandt was president of CBC Film Sales, handling sales, marketing and distribution from New York along with Jack Cohn, while Harry Cohn ran production in Hollywood. The studio's early productions were low-budget short subjects: "Screen Snapshots", the "Hall Room Boys" (the vaudeville duo of Edward Flanagan and Neely Edwards), and the Chaplin imitator Billy West.[7] The start-up CBC leased space in a Poverty Row studio on Hollywood's famously low-rent Gower Street. Among Hollywood's elite, the studio's small-time reputation led some to joke that "CBC" stood for "Corned Beef and Cabbage".[5]

Brandt eventually tired of dealing with the Cohn brothers, and sold his one-third stake to Harry Cohn, who took over as president. In an effort to improve its image, the Cohn brothers renamed the company Columbia Pictures Corporation on January 10, 1924.[8] Cohn remained head of production as well, thus concentrating enormous power in his hands. He would run Columbia for the next 34 years, the second-longest tenure of any studio chief, behind only Warner Bros.' Jack L. Warner. Even in an industry rife with nepotism, Columbia was particularly notorious for having a number of Harry and Jack's relatives in high positions. Humorist Robert Benchley called it the Pine Tree Studio, "because it has so many Cohns".[9]

Columbia's product line consisted mostly of moderately budgeted features and short subjects including comedies, sports films, various serials, and cartoons. Columbia gradually moved into the production of higher-budget fare, eventually joining the second tier of Hollywood studios along with United Artists and Universal. Like United Artists and Universal, Columbia was a horizontally integrated company. It controlled production and distribution; it did not own any theaters.

Helping Columbia's climb was the arrival of an ambitious director, Frank Capra. Between 1927 and 1939, Capra constantly pushed Cohn for better material and bigger budgets. A string of hits he directed in the early and mid 1930s solidified Columbia's status as a major studio. In particular, It Happened One Night, which nearly swept the 1934 Oscars, put Columbia on the map. Until then, Columbia's very existence had depended on theater owners willing to take its films, since as mentioned above it didn't have a theater network of its own. Other Capra-directed hits followed, including the original version of Lost Horizon (1937), with Ronald Colman, and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939), which made James Stewart a major star.

Columbia could not afford to keep a huge roster of contract stars, so Cohn usually borrowed them from other studios. At Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, the industry's most prestigious studio, Columbia was nicknamed "Siberia", as Louis B. Mayer would use the loan out to Columbia as a way to punish his less-obedient signings. In the 1930s, it signed Jean Arthur to a long-term contract, and after The Whole Town's Talking (1935), Arthur became a major comedy star. Ann Sothern's lustrous career was launched when Columbia signed her to a contract in 1936. Cary Grant signed a contract in 1937 and soon after it was altered to a non-exclusive contract shared with RKO.

According to Bob Thomas's book King Cohn, studio chief Harry Cohn always placed a high priority on serials. Beginning in 1937, Columbia entered the lucrative serial market, and kept making these episodic adventures until 1956, after other studios had discontinued them. The most famous Columbia serials are based on comic-strip or radio characters: Mandrake the Magician, The Shadow, Terry and the Pirates, Captain Midnight, The Phantom, Batman, and Superman, among many others.

Harry Cohn monitored the budgets of his films, and the studio got the maximum use out of costly sets, costumes, and props by reusing them in other films. Many of Columbia's low-budget "B" pictures and short subjects have an expensive look, thanks to Columbia's efficient recycling policy. Cohn was reluctant to spend lavish sums on even his most important pictures, and it was not until 1943 that he agreed to use three-strip Technicolor in a live-action feature. (Columbia was the last major studio to employ the expensive color process.) Columbia's first Technicolor feature was the western The Desperadoes, starring Randolph Scott and Glenn Ford. Cohn quickly used Technicolor again for Cover Girl, a Hayworth vehicle that instantly was a smash hit, released in 1944, and for the fanciful biography of Frédéric Chopin, A Song to Remember, with Cornel Wilde, released in 1945. Another biopic, 1946's The Jolson Story with Larry Parks and Evelyn Keyes, was started in black-and-white, but when Cohn saw how well the project was proceeding, he scrapped the footage and insisted on filming in Technicolor.

In 1948, the United States v. Paramount Pictures, Inc.anti-trust decision forced Hollywood motion picture companies to divest themselves of the theatre chains that they owned. Since Columbia did not own any theaters, it was now on equal terms with the largest studios, and soon replaced RKO on the list of the "Big Five" studios.

In 1946, Columbia dropped the Screen Gems brand from its cartoon line, but retained the Screen Gems name for various ancillary activities, including a 16 mm film-rental agency and a TV-commercial production company. In November 1948, Columbia adopted the Screen Gems name for its television production subsidiary when the studio acquired Pioneer Telefilms, a television commercial company founded by Harry Cohn's nephew, Ralph Cohn.[12] Pioneer was originally founded in 1947, later reorganized as Screen Gems.[12] The studio opened its doors for business in New York on April 15, 1949.[12] By 1951, Screen Gems became a fully-fledged television studio and became a major producer of situation comedies for TV, beginning with Father Knows Best and followed by The Donna Reed Show, The Partridge Family, Bewitched, I Dream of Jeannie, and The Monkees.

On July 1, 1956, studio veteran Irving Briskin stepped down as stage manager of Columbia Pictures and form his production company Briskin Productions, Inc. to release series through Screen Gems and supervise all of its productions.[13] On December 10, Screen Gems expanded into television syndication by acquiring Hygo Television Films (a.k.a. Serials Inc.) and its affiliated company United Television Films, Inc. Hygo Television Films was founded in 1951 by Jerome Hyams, who also acquired United Television Films in 1955 that was founded by Archie Mayers.[14]

By 1950 Columbia had discontinued most of its popular series films (Boston Blackie, Blondie, The Lone Wolf, The Crime Doctor, Rusty, etc.) Only Jungle Jim, launched by producer Sam Katzman in 1949, kept going through 1955. Katzman contributed greatly to Columbia's success by producing dozens of topical feature films, including crime dramas, science-fiction stories, and rock-'n'-roll musicals. Columbia kept making serials until 1956 and two-reel comedies until 1957, after other studios had abandoned them.

As the larger studios declined in the 1950s, Columbia's position improved. This was largely because it did not suffer from the massive loss of income that the other major studios suffered from the loss of their theaters (well over 90 percent, in some cases). Columbia continued to produce 40-plus pictures a year, offering productions that often broke ground and kept audiences coming to theaters such as its adaptation of the controversial James Jones novel, From Here to Eternity (1953), On the Waterfront (1954), and The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957) with William Holden and Alec Guinness. All three films won the Best Picture Oscar.

By 1966, the studio was suffering from box-office failures, and takeover rumors began surfacing. Columbia was surviving solely on the profits made from Screen Gems, whose holdings also included radio and television stations.[15] On December 23, 1968, Screen Gems merged with Columbia Pictures Corporation and became part of the newly formed Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. for $24.5 million.[16]

Nearly bankrupt by the early 1970s, the studio was saved via a radical overhaul: the Gower Street Studios (now called "Sunset Gower Studios") were sold and a new management team was brought in. In 1972, Columbia and Warner Bros. formed a partnership called "The Burbank Studios" in which both companies shared the Warner studio lot in Burbank. While fiscal health was restored through a careful choice of star-driven vehicles,[citation needed] the studio's image was badly hurt by the David Begelman check-forging scandal. Begelman eventually resigned (later ending up at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer before committing suicide in 1995), and the studio's fortunes gradually recovered.

From 1971 until the end of 1987, Columbia's international distribution operations were a joint venture with Warner Bros., and in some countries, this joint venture also distributed films from other companies (like EMI Films and Cannon Films in the UK). Warners pulled out of the venture in 1988 to join up with Walt Disney Pictures.[citation needed]

On May 6, 1974, Columbia retired the Screen Gems name from television, renaming its television division Columbia Pictures Television. The name was suggested by David Gerber, who was then-president of Columbia's television division.[17] The same year, Columbia Pictures acquired Rastar Pictures, which included Rastar Productions, Rastar Features, and Rastar Television. Ray Stark then founded Rastar Films, the reincarnation of Rastar Pictures and it was acquired by Columbia Pictures in February 1980.[18]

In December 1976, Columbia Pictures acquired the arcade game company D. Gottlieb & Co. for $50 million.[19]

In fall 1978, Kirk Kerkorian, a Vegas casino mogul who also controlled Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, acquired a 5.5% stake in Columbia Pictures.[20] He then announced on November 20, to launch a tender offer to acquire another 20% for the studio.[20] On December 14, a standstill agreement was reached with Columbia by promising not to go beyond 25% or seeking control for at least three years.[20]

On January 15, 1979, the Justice Department filed an antitrust suit against Kerkorian, to block him from holding stake in Columbia, while controlling MGM.[20] On February 19, 1979, Columbia Pictures Television acquired TOY Productions; the production company founded by Bud Yorkin and writers Saul Turteltaub and Bernie Orenstein in 1976.[21] In May, Kerkorian acquired an additional 214,000 shares in Columbia, raising his stake to 25%.[20] On August 2, the suit trial opened at the Justice Department, however, on August 14, the court ruled in favor for Kerkorian.[20]

On September 30, 1980, Kerkorian sued Columbia for ignoring shareholders' interest and violating an agreement with him.[20] Columbia later accused him on October 2, for scheming with Nelson Bunker hunt to gain control of Columbia.

In 1981, Kerkorian sold his 25% stake in Columbia back to CPI.[20] Columbia Pictures later acquired 81% of The Walter Reade Organization, which owned 11 theaters; it purchased the remaining 19% in 1985.

Lots of changes took place in 1986. Expanding its television franchise, on May 5, Columbia also bought Merv Griffin Enterprises, notable for successful shows: Wheel of Fortune, Jeopardy!, Dance Fever, and The Merv Griffin Show for $250 million.[27][28] Months later on August 28, the Columbia Pictures Television Group acquired Danny Arnold's Danny Arnold Productions, Inc. including the rights to the successful sitcom Barney Miller (Four D Productions) among other produced series such as Fish (The Mimus Corporation), A.E.S. Hudson Street (Triseme Corporation), and Joe Bash (Tetagram Ltd.), after Arnold dropped the federal and state lawsuits against the television studio accusing them for antitrust violations, fraud, and breach of fiduciary duty.[29][30][31] Coca-Cola sold the Embassy Pictures division to Dino de Laurentiis, who later folded Embassy Pictures into Dino de Laurentiis Productions, Inc. and became De Laurentiis Entertainment Group. Coca-Cola also sold Embassy Home Entertainment to Nelson Entertainment. Coke however, retained the Embassy Pictures name, logo, and trademark. HBO was the last partner drop out of the Tri-Star venture and sold its shares to Columbia [32] Tri-Star later expanded into the television business with its new Tri-Star Television division. The same year, Columbia recruited British producer David Puttnam to head the studio. Puttnam attempted to defy Hollywood filmmaking by making smaller films instead of big tentpole pictures. His criticism of American film production, in addition to the fact that the films he greenlit were mostly flops, left Coke and Hollywood discerned [clarification needed] that Puttnam was ousted from the position after only one year.[33]

On June 26, 1987, Coca-Cola sold The Walter Reade Organization to Cineplex Odeon Corporation.[34] On October 14, 1987, Coca-Cola's entertainment division invested in $30 million in Castle Rock Entertainment with five Hollywood executives. Coke's entertainment business division owned 40% in Castle Rock, while the execs owned 60%.[35]

The volatile film business made Coke shareholders nervous, and following the box-office failure Ishtar, Coke spun off its entertainment holdings on December 21, 1987 and sold it to Tri-Star Pictures for $3.1 billion, also creating Columbia/Tri-Star by merging Columbia and Tri-Star. Tri-Star Pictures, Inc. was renamed to Columbia Pictures Entertainment, Inc.(CPE), with Coke owning 80% of the company.[36] Both studios continued to produce and distribute films under their separate names.[37] Puttnam was succeeded by Dawn Steel, the first woman to run a Hollywood motion picture studio. Other small-scale, "boutique" entities were created: Nelson Entertainment, a joint venture with British and Canadian partners, Triumph Films, jointly owned with French studio Gaumont, and which is now a low-budget label, and Castle Rock Entertainment. On January 4, 1988, Columbia/Embassy Television and Tri-Star Television were formed into the new Columbia Pictures Television and Embassy Communications was renamed to ELP Communications. On January 16, 1988, CPE's stock fell slightly in the market on its first day trading in the New York Stock Exchange. Coke spun off 34.1 million of its Columbia shares to its shareholders by reducing its stake in CPE from 80% to 49%.[38] On April 13, 1988, CPE spun off Tri-Star Pictures, Inc. as a reformed company of the Tri-Star studio.[39]

On February 2, 1989, Columbia Pictures Television formed a joint-venture with Norman Lear's Act III Communications called Act III Television to produce television series instead of managing.[40][41]

The Columbia Pictures empire was sold on September 28, 1989 to electronics giant Sony for the amount of $3.4 billion, one of several Japanese firms then buying American properties. The sale netted Coca-Cola a handsome profit from its investment in the studio.[42] Sony then hired two producers, Peter Guber and Jon Peters, to serve as co-heads of production when Sony also acquired the Guber-Peters Entertainment Company (the former game show production company, Barris Industries, Inc.) for $200 million on September 29, 1989.[43] Guber and Peters had just signed a long-term contract with Warner Bros. in 1989, having been with the company since 1983. To extricate them from this contract, Steve Ross, Warner Bros.'s boss sued Sony for $1 billion.[44] Sony completed CPE's acquisition on November 8 and the Guber-Peters acquisition was completed on the following day.

Columbia Pictures painting on the outer wall of Sony Pictures Studios after the 1993 change.

In 1990, Sony ended up paying hundreds of millions of dollars, gave up a half-interest in its Columbia House Records Club mail-order business, and bought from Time Warner the former Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studio in Culver City, which Warner Communications had acquired in its takeover of Lorimar-Telepictures in 1989, thus ending the Burbank Studios partnership. Initially renamed Columbia Studios, Sony spent $100 million to refurbish the rechristened Sony Pictures Studios. Guber and Peters set out to prove they were worth this fortune, but though there were to be some successes, there were also many costly flops. The same year, Frank Price was made as the chairman of Columbia Pictures. His company Price Entertainment, Inc. that he founded in 1987, was merged with Columbia in March 1991. Price left Columbia on October 4, 1991 and was replaced by Warner Bros. executive Mark Canton and reactivated Price Entertainment as Price Entertainment Company with a non-exclusive deal with SPE.[46] Peters was fired by his partner Guber in 1991, but Guber later resigned in 1994 to form Mandalay Entertainment the following year.[47] The entire operation was reorganized and renamed Sony Pictures Entertainment (SPE) on August 7, 1991,[48] and at the same time, TriStar (which had officially lost its hyphen) relaunched its television division in October. In December 1991, SPE created Sony Pictures Classics for arthouse fare and was headed by Michael Barker, Tom Bernard, and Marcie Bloom,[49] whom previously operated United Artists Classics and Orion Classics. Publicly humiliated, Sony suffered an enormous loss on its investment in Columbia, taking a $2.7 billion write-off in 1994. John Calley took over as SPE president in November 1996, installing Amy Pascal as Columbia Pictures president and Chris Lee as president of production at TriStar. By the next spring, the studios were clearly rebounding, setting a record pace at the box office.[50] On December 7, 1992, Sony Pictures acquired the Barry & Enright game show library.[51]

In the 1990s, Columbia announced plans of a rival James Bond franchise, since they owned the rights of Casino Royale and were planning to make a third version of Thunderball with Kevin McClory. MGM and Danjaq, LLC, owners of the franchise, sued Sony Pictures in 1997, with the legal dispute ending two years later in an out-of-court settlement. Sony traded the Casino Royale rights for $10 million, and the Spider-Man filming rights.[59] The superhero has since become Columbia's most successful franchise,[60] with the first movie coming out in 2002 and having since gained two sequels, with plans for two more. Ironically, between the releases of the first and second sequels, Sony Corporation led a consortium that purchased MGM – giving it distribution rights to the James Bond franchise.

In 1997, Columbia Pictures ranked as the highest-grossing movie studio in the United States with a gross of $1.256 billion. In 1998, Columbia and TriStar merged to form the Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group (a.k.a. Columbia TriStar Pictures), though both studios still produce and distribute under their own names. Pascal retained her position as president of the newly united Columbia Pictures, while Lee became the combined studio's head of production.[61] On December 8, 1998, Sony Pictures Entertainment relaunched the Screen Gems brand as a horror and independent film distribution company after shutting down Triumph Films.[62] In 1999, TriStar Television was folded into CTT. Two years later, CPT was folded into CTT as well.

In the 2000s, Sony broadened its release schedule by backing Revolution Studios, the production/distribution company headed by Joe Roth. On October 25, 2001 CTT and CTTD merged to form Columbia TriStar Domestic Television.[63] On September 16, 2002, Columbia TriStar Domestic Television was renamed to Sony Pictures Television.[64] Also in 2002, Columbia broke the record for biggest domestic theatrical gross, with a tally of $1.575 billion, coincidentally breaking its own record of $1.256 billion set in 1997, which was raised by such blockbusters as Spider-Man, Men in Black II and xXx.[65] The studio was also the most lucrative of 2004,[65] with over $1.338 billion in the domestic box office with movies such as Spider-Man 2, 50 First Dates, and The Grudge,[66] and in 2006, Columbia, helped with such blockbusters as: The Da Vinci Code, The Pursuit of Happyness, Casino Royale, and Open Season, not only finished the year in first place, but it reached an all-time record high sum of $1.711 billion, which was an all-time yearly record for any studio until Warner Bros. surpassed it in 2009.[67]

On October 29, 2010, Matt Tolmach, the co-president of Columbia Pictures, stepped down to produce the next installment of Spider-Man. Doug Belgrad, the other co-president of Columbia was promoted as sole president of the studio. Belgrad and Tolmach had been co-presidents of the studio since 2008 and had been working together as a team in 2003.[68][69] The same day, Hanna Minghella was named president of production of Columbia.[68][69]

The Columbia Pictures logo, a woman carrying a torch and wearing a drape (representing Columbia, a personification of the United States), has gone through five major revisions.[72][73][74]

In 1924, Columbia Pictures used a logo featuring a female Roman soldier holding a shield in her left hand and a stick of wheat in her right hand. The logo changed in 1928 with the figure wearing a draped flag and torch. The woman wore the stola and carried the palla of ancient Rome, and above her were the words "A Columbia Production" ("A Columbia Picture" or "Columbia Pictures Corporation") written in an arch. The illustration was based upon the actress Evelyn Venable, known for providing the voice of The Blue Fairy in Walt Disney's Pinocchio.

In 1936, the logo was changed: the Torch Lady now stood on a pedestal, wore no headdress, and the text "Columbia" appeared in chiseled letters behind her (Pittsburgh native Jane Chester Bartholomew, whom Harry Cohn discovered, portrayed the Torch Lady in the logo). There were several variations to the logo over the years—significantly, a color version was done in 1943 for The Desperadoes.[74] Two years earlier, the flag became just a drape with no markings.[72][73] The latter change came after a federal law was passed making it illegal to wear an American flag as clothing. 1976's Taxi Driver was one of the last films to use the "Torch Lady" in her classic appearance.

From 1976 to 1993,[72] Columbia Pictures used two logos. The first, from 1976 to 1981 (1976 to 1982 for international territories) used just a sunburst representing the beams from the torch. The Torch Lady returned in 1981, but in a much smoother form than her 1936-76 appearance. The score accompanying the first logo was composed by Suzanne Ciani. The studio hired visual effects pioneer Robert Abel to animate the first logo.[75]

The current logo was created in 1992, when the logo was repainted digitally by New Orleans artist Michael Deas,[76] who was commissioned by Sony to return the woman to her "classic" look.[77] Michael Deas hired Jenny Joseph, a graphics artist for The Times-Picayune, as a model for the logo.[78] Due to time constraints, she agreed to help out on her lunch break. The animation was created by Synthespian Studios in 1993 by Jeff Kleiser and Diana Walczak, who used 2D elements from the painting and converted it to 3D.[79] In 2012, Jenny Joseph gave an interview to WWL-TV: “So we just scooted over there come lunchtime and they wrapped a sheet around me and I held a regular little desk lamp, a side lamp,” she said, “and I just held that up and we did that with a light bulb." Artist Michael Deas went on to say, "I never thought it would make it to the silver screen and I never thought it would still be up 20 years later, and I certainly never thought it would be in a museum, so it’s kind of gratifying.”[80]

^Thompson, Anne (2006-10-17). "Sony Pictures Classics at 15". The Hollywood Reporter. Archived from the original on 2010-03-04. Retrieved 2010-03-04. They stay behind the films and manage to find a significant core audience for a large number of them, with the occasional $130 million blowout like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon," [former United Artists president Bingham] Ray says. "But they spend a fraction of what a major studio would spend to get the same number. Their philosophy is not to pile a lot of money on everything. They run a tight ship; they don't have an army of people working for them. They keep things simple.